Even if he'd been jailed, I would still be marrying my Father's 4 Justice 'super hero'

Saturday 19 May 2007 20:51 BST

She is the beautiful blonde who inspired James Blunt to write his award-winning album Back To Bedlam, and to whom the singer dedicated his number one hit You're Beautiful in front of thousands of adoring fans.

Holed up in a grungy flat in Fulham, West London, when the ex-Army officer was desperately trying to get a record deal, it was Camilla Boler who guided the then unknown Blunt through the early stages of his career and encouraged him to pen his hugely successful album.

But since dedicating his ubiquitous hit to Camilla, a pretty heiress and aspiring singer, their love life has been anything but beautiful.

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Their two-year romance has been tested by long periods apart, the overwhelming pressures of James's overnight fame and persistent whispers that the singer has been unfaithful.

For months, there has been speculation that their relationship was over after reports in March thathe had had an affair with socialite turned TV presenter Tara Palmer-Tomkinson.

A few weeks before that, the former Household Cavalryman had been spotted at a Manhattan nightclub hand-in-hand with Czech supermodel Petra Nemcova. But Blunt, 32, denied rumours of an affair and insisted they were just friends.

Then, two weeks ago, Camilla's worst fears were confirmed with the heartbreaking evidence that he was cheating on her.

Seemingly oblivious to a prying lens, a pale and pasty looking Blunt was snapped frolicking in the Spanish surf with beautiful 26-year-old Petraduring a break in his nine-month world tour.

Leaning over to caress his belly, the supermodel, who lost her photographer fiance in the Boxing Day tsunami in 2004, appeared mesmerised by Blunt. And despite being on a public beach in Ibiza, the couple made no attempt to hide their intimacy.

Now, in a searingly honest and emotional interview, Camilla reveals how she learned about the pictures when a friend called to tell her that there was unquestionable evidence that Blunt was cheating on herI realised something was wrong because she told me to sit down,' says Camilla, now 24. She told me a newspaper had printed pictures of James on a beach with Petra. I felt as if I was being chewed up and couldn't bring myself to look at the newspapers."

Next day, she says, shelogged on to one of his websites. "I just stared at the pictures. The weird thing was that it wasn't the pictures of him hugging her that Camilla revealed to The Mail on Sunday how she and the Harrow-educated singer split up in April this year, but decided to give their relationship another chance just days before the devastating pictures appeared.

"He called (in late May) and asked me to go to the Ivor Novello music awards in London with him," she says.

"I wanted to go. If I'm honest, I hadn't given up on the idea that we'd end up back together.

"It turned out to be one of the most surreal days of our whole relationship. My car pulled up outside the venue and the first thing I saw was James in front of banks of cameras - the photographers were going crazy. I was standing there staring with my mouth open. It would have made an incredible photograph, but one of James's assistants jumped in and hustled me back into the car and round to the back entrance.

"Even so, it was great to see James. I started off shaking like a leaf, but he was my old James. We actually had a real laugh. When he won one of his two awards, he gave me a kiss on the cheek and we spent the rest of the day together. I tried to keep it light but found it impossible not to talk about us.

"A week later he stayed with me for two days. He wanted to be with me and I wanted to be with him - it was simple. We were being silly, having fun. He told me that he felt really lonely because he spends so much time travelling. If he'd been with Petra by then, he had every opportunity to tell me. But maybe he didn't have the courage or the decency."

In a bitter twist, Camilla reveals how, after their two nights together, they met up again a few days later in Spain and she drove Blunt to Madrid station so he could catch a train to the airport.

"It's ironic, but I dropped him off so he could catch a flight to Ibiza. Two days later those pictures appeared. We haven't spoken since."

Camilla, the daughter of the late kitchen tycoon Stephen Boler, recalls how she felt intimidated by statuesque Petra when they met while Camilla was travelling with Blunt in America a year ago. Despite rumours that he had grown close to Petra, Camilla believed they were just good friends and didn't want to appear to be a suspicious girlfriend.

"Being honest, it did make me insecure, but I didn't want to let that show,' she admits. "He was under so much pressure. I didn't want to be the nagging girlfriend.

"You have a choice when you are with someone famous - you can follow them around and get to spend a few minutes a day with them or you can get on with your own life. I chose the latter. I'm an independent girl. I have my own music career.

"Maybe I was wrong to give him so much space, but I couldn't bear to be yet another person making demands on him. I loved him too much for that.

When I went to America last year to stay with James when he was on Saturday Night Live, Petra was in the backstage area and something about her made me worry. Basically, she's so incredibly hot. They obviously knew each other but James didn't introduce meAnd she didn't go near him while I was there.

"Still, I had to ask him who she was. He told me how she'd lost her boyfriend in the tsunami and how she'd suffered terrible injuries. I felt really bad that I'd been suspicious of her and immediately told James I was happy he was her friend."

Blunt had also insisted that Tara Palmer-Tomkinson was just a friend when it was claimed that the pair were having an affair. He reportedly spent a night with her after she saw him perform at New York's Webster Hall in March.

"Of course, there had been rumours about other women,' says Camilla. "But I never believed them. The day before the story about him and Tara hit the papers, James called to warn me. He told me it was untrue and we ended up laughing about it.

"I have nothing against Tara. I was more upset that I was misquoted as saying she was a publicity seeker. And it seemed like every month there was another story about James and another woman - the actress Mischa Barton and Jessica Sutta from the Pussycat Dolls."

Miss Palmer-Tomkinson refused to deny the romance at the time, saying: "If nothing happened between James and me, then I would come right out and say nothing had happened. And I haven't done that, have I? It's pretty easy to work out what I'm saying."

Camilla still insists she believes Blunt did not cheat on her with Miss Palmer-Tomkinson. But she does admit that their relationship became increas- ingly strained as a result of his gruelling work schedule.

"The truth is that James ended our relationship in April,' she says. "I was at someone's house in Glastonbury and he was in America when he called me. I actually had a flight booked to America to see him the week after, but as soon as I heard his voice I knew it was over.

"Things hadn't been good for a while because we'd spent so much time apart. It's such a cliche, but his incredible success had put an enormous pressure on our relationship. There was no time for us as a couple. It was all just about fitting in a few hours in his crazy schedule.

"Still, I didn't want it to end. I said everything I could think of to make him change his mind. We were both crying but he said he just couldn't keep the relationship going."

Although they had been together for two years, Camilla and James first met six years ago while she was working as a barmaid in a pub in Fulham. "When I was 18 I moved to London to be with my sister and got a job in a pubwas just this musician who knew some of my friends. I knew he liked me a long time before anythinghappened.

"It was only two years ago that we got together. He invited me to a party the day before I was due to fly to Australia for a month. We stayed up all night talking and he was waiting for me when I got back.

"At the time he had a pokey flat in Fulham and he was trying to get a deal. It was all quite grungy. I went on the road with him, sleeping together on a tiny bunk in the tour bus. I loved it because it was a world I wanted to belong to - doing tiny gigs, eating chips at midnight in service stations. James wasn't famous but we were completely happy and in love.

But, she says, 'things started to change once the buzz about his music began. I'd go with him to gigs but this circle would form round him, pushing me to the edge. He'd always hold out his hand to pull me in, but as he got bigger, the circles got bigger and we couldn't physically hold on.

"James would be dragged one way and it was up to me to fight my way towards him. The busier he got, the more I threw myself into my music. He was very supportive - we still had this incredible bond."

Of his most famous song, You're Beautiful, Camilla, claims that Blunt only dedicated the song to her. It was in fact inspired by his ex-girlfriend Dixie Chassay

"Everybody thinks You're Beautiful was written about me,' says Camilla. "He dedicated it to me at a gig on my birthday. But it's always had mixed emotions for me because it ends, "I'll never be with you."

"Yet I thought that nothing could change us. We talked about marriage and children - there was never a question that our future wasn't together."

While Camilla claims to have no regrets about their relationship and insists she has moved on, she believes that fame has changed the man she met and fell in love with.

"James did change,' she says. "Fame didn't seem to make him happy. One of the things I loved about him was that he was always so laid back. That changed. He would get really on edge - always on the lookout for someone jumping out at him. I'd try to calm him down but that whole celebrity thing is hard to deal with.

"I can honestly say that the experience hasn't made me bitter. It's just made me sad that someone I loved and thought I really knew could let this happen. Doing this interview has helped me draw that line. Life goes on and my music goes on, too. James plays to thousands of people and I play tiny venues, but it makes me happy. Happy is all I want to be."

l A full version of this interview appears in Grazia magazine, out on Tuesday.